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"I move around a lot because things tend to get bad when I stay."

Finally saw Five Easy Pieces tonight. I'd waited this long mostly cuz I thought it might annoy me, via my occasional impatience with baby boomers and, by extension, some of the icons they celebrate. And I mostly don't care for Jack Nicholson. But it was on the big screen, which is a draw, and I'm glad I went. And glad I waited this long, and saw it first that way. And that I toughed out a little anxiety attack to get myself to the theater.

It's a visually evocative, visceral film. Like in the oil rig stuff, and stuff like raw, close-up running mascara, too. The famous diner scene is a little funny, even if you'd seen a clip of it a dozen times, and it's better in context, but the one goin'-on hitchhiker got a bigger laugh outta me. The best surprise was how subtlely the not-laughs play, and how slowly and well the film reveals Bobby's story. And so cinematically. I didn't know to expect such a thing. Nor that a young Fannie Flagg would be in there, debuting. Loved how she prepped to bowl.

The establishing long shot of Bobby with his father, at the end, setting up their "talk," is a doozy---probably especially on the big screen. There they are, against the sky, taking up maybe only the bottom 1/6th of the picture. If that.

Had lots of other thoughts during the film, but that's a few. It was in the "summer classics" series at the local art cinema, where the speech beforehand thanking all the sponsors and asking for our support was way long---Bobby mighta thrown something. And how Jack would feel hearing they've been promoting the movie by saying he plays a "former musical ingénue," I'd kinda like to find out. They're showing these movies on Sunday afternoons & Tuesday nights, so you've missed this one if you didn't see it, but still to come, among others, are Dial M for Murder (in 3-D) and Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid. Oh, and that old chestnut Battleship Potemkin, with organ accompaniment.